1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile, self-contained apparatus for the storage, dispensing and serving of both hot and cold liquid beverages. The apparatus comprises a unitary, essentially rectangular-shaped, housing having a plurality of both internal and external non-communicating, thermally-insulated chambers for the storage and dispensing of liquid beverages and their components. This apparatus also comprises the necessary heat-exchange control means for maintaining the stored beverages at the desired serving temperatures.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Portable and mobile self-contained beverage dispensing bars have heretofore been designed and employed primarily for use in offices, homes, railways, and airlines, and have therefore been of limited utility in commercial settings involving the serving of large numbers of people in a limited amount of time. Problems relating to maintenance of beverage temperature control of stored beverages on the prior art carts have not been adequately solved, resulting in short beverage storage periods, with the necessity of additional means needed for both heating and cooling of the stored liquids. It, therefore, has been the object of the present invention to overcome these, as well as other difficulties of the prior art. Further, the configurations of other prior art designs has led to a limited flexibility in function which has been further overcome by the convertibility features of the present invention.
The hotel, motel, restaurant and food service industries derive a significant portion of their sales by catering to conventions, conferences, meetings and similar functions, renting a function room to the participants and furnishing beverages at periodic intervals for a consideration. In such an environment, the time for serving beverages is very limited, regardless of the size of the group, most usually limited to a ten to fifteen minute "coffee break." The beverages must be brought into the room, served at the proper temperature in a short time period and then removed from the room. The usual beverages served are coffee, tea and soft drinks. It is industry practice to serve up to one hundred and fifty people these beverages in ten minutes from a single serving table.
From long experience in the industry, the inventors known that there is no commercially available dispensing and serving cart which can meet the industry's needs. A review of the prior patent art also reveals no serving cart which can meet these commercial requirements. At present the industry uses portable folding tables, table cloths, ice buckets and portable urns, and other miscellaneous items. The serving table and equipment are assembled prior to each serving and disassembled thereafter. The labor cost is high, and the equipment cost is high. Some components are discarded after a single use. No component has a useful life of more than three months. Hot beverages are kept warm by fuel sources which have an open flame, a constant fire hazard, as well as a continuing expense. Over the short useful life of a coffee urn, the cost of the fuel to keep the coffee warm will exceed the cost of the urn. The mobile beverage dispensing cart of the present invention is specifically designed to meet the requirements of the industry and eliminate the problems encountered in prior equipment. It is equiped to serve one hundred and fifty people in ten minutes with all beverages being served at the proper temperature. It uses no fuel source, and thus has no open flame and no fuel cost. Its cost is comparable to the present equipment costs, but it requires no assembly for each use. It is further designed to be durable to eliminate continuous replacement costs. It is completely self-contained and may be moved into and out of a function room very quickly.